Times Spent Outdoors: Priceless!

SHOT Show - Day Four

Last day of the show! If you wanted to see every exhibitor here, you'd have less than a minute per booth - so obviously we haven't seen everything. Our plan was to visit NEXT first, which we did. NEXT is a few rows of very small tables in the middle of a hallway - it's for the companies who will be exhibiting for real next year. Always good stuff there. Then we went to the New Products Showcase and write down booth numbers that we want to visit for more info. I also had a list going in - because of emails that various companies send to us before the show.

Once we have a list, we start circling booths on the map. The layout takes some getting used to, but marking all the booths we want to see on the map lets us navigate in some kind of order, and we can be sure we won't miss the booths we really want to see. It's crazy, and I know we miss a lot of great stuff, but it is physically impossible to see it all. So here's the last of our daily reports.

There are a lot of self defense products at the show that are NOT guns, including a new one from GuardDog called the Olympian. Available in black or pink, the Olympian is a stun gun, pepper spray, and flashlight all in one easy to carry little package. It retails for around $55, and it's not on their website yet, but you can see them (and buy one) at http://www.sportsmansguide.com .

If, God forbid, you are ever forced to use your firearm in self defense, your nightmare is just beginning. Next up: the court system. One thing that could really help your case is a Plan Beta Tacticam. This little camera sits directly under the barrel of your pistol and is activated by a simple finger press. The high resolution camera is $75 and the low resolution one is $39. It saves video to a micro SD card and has about a one hour capacity. You can use a USB cable to upload the video to a computer. The camera mounts to the Picatinny rail on your pistol, and you can also use it just for fun. It would also be great to use in a gun class so you could review your performance. Check them out at http://www.planbeta.net .

Peltor has some great new hearing and eye protection this year. We were able to try the new muffs and they were awesome - not even the 50 caliber guns made me jump. The earmuffs allow you to hear conversations butcthey reduce gun reports dramatically. They have a volume switch on the side.

If you've been using earplugs or regular non-electronic earmuffs, you owe it to yourself to check out the Peltor muffs. They also have really comfortable, flexible safety glasses. See all their safety gear at

peltorcomms.3m.com.

Ultimate Survival Technologies was one of our favorite booths. These guys have it all - collapsing mess kits, cups, etc - called Flexware, a flameless lighter called Tekfire that uses electricity to create a fire - no flame on the lighter itself, collapsible lanterns, and lots more. The collapsible lantern at $25 is rechargeable and can also be used as a powerbank to charge your phone. A non-recharging model is $15 and runs on 3 AA batteries. The Dura Lantern can be dropped and not be harmed, and can run continuously for 30 days on low! It takes 3 D batteries. They've also got a $25 solar recharge lantern with a USB port. One of our favorite things at this booth was the Stay Safe Kit ($15). It has a survival bandana, bright orange with survival info printed on it, an emergency poncho, an aluminum whistle, survival blanket, and 2 4-inch light sticks. This is perfect for your kids to carry every time you are out. Their gear is sturdy and very reasonably priced. Go to http://www.ustbrands.com to get them.

Well that's it for day 4, the last day of the 2017 SHOT Show.

We'll be telling you about more of the great stuff we saw soon.

 

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